I love AMC prototypes. Still on the lookout for the Hornet GT and the Gremlin G-II concepts from the mid-1970s. If I could find or replicate the black Rebel Machine prototype, I’d be in heaven. But there’s at least one AMC prototype I’d gnaw off my left arm to escape from.

Don’t know much about it. Don’t know what it was called. Don’t know why AMC built it. But Eddie Stakes recently sent me these photos of an AMX/Gremlin/Rambler thing.

There is interesting article for you, a sort of Where’s Waldo of AMC. Note Manufacturers YOM plates on it…..that is project manager standing on left. This is AMC Skunkworks outside Milwaukee. This AMX/Rambler/Gremlin thing was stolen off streets of Kenosha and never seen again, so need to bring in Scooby & Shaggy on this one!

Maybe whoever buys the Tornado can track this dog down and display them side-by-side. I’d then pay good money to not enter that building.

I have a 1979 AMX prototype that was built in 1977. It is a version of the production car that was launched in 1979 as a trim package off the Spirit. I have the records and even the visor card that was used to identify the car to executives who drove it. The VIN still reads SP9414D. Sp means skin prototype. 9 meant 79 model year. 4 meant hatchback. 14 means the 14th prototype built and D meant V8 engine.

I still drive the car. It has about 35,000 miles, black with a 304 and 4 speed transmission. It was used for some styling trials and has some funky trim on the sills, but all there and rides wonderfully.

I believe this particular car was somehow damaged at the Burlington test track, and instead of simply destroying it, was used to customize from existing stock to see what might have worked. I have to admit this car fromt he rear looks like a chihuahua someone stuck a boot in it’s rear though. I have never seen a front end view of this car and do not think one exists. But it is my understanding from a converstaion I had in 1970s that this car was damaged and used to play with afterwards. Would love to see it resurface one day but it has been over 4 decades since last seen, and while stranger things have surfaced with all sorts of barn finds with economy in toilet last several years, would like to see this be a barn or basement find…would fly up to document it as it has been on my AMC radar since disco was still hot. Eddie Stakes